however dry it may be.  This is gathered to be fed to them, for if they have access to the place where it is growing they will destroy the plant by trampling on it, or else kill themselves by eating too much of it, for they are greedy by nature.  For this reason they must be watched, as often in feeding their greediness leads them to seize a root and to break their own necks in attempting to pull it from the ground:  for the neck is weak, as the head is soft.

“If there is none of this plant they should be fed barley or some other grain.  When the farrago season is on, feed that to them, but in the same manner as I have described in respect of endive.  While they are setting they may be fed ground barley soaked in water.  The goslings may be fed for the first two days on barley cake (pollenta) or raw barley, and for the next three days fresh water cress chopped fine in a dish.  When they are of an age to be kept by themselves in flocks of twenty, in the kind of house I have described, they are fed on barley meal or farrago or some kind of young herbage cut up.

“For cramming, goslings are picked out when they are about six months old, and are shut up in the fattening pen and there are fed three times a day as much as they will eat, of crushed barley and flour dust mixed with water, and after meals they should be made to drink copiously.  Kept on this diet they will be fat in about two months.[189] After every meal the feeding place must be cleaned, for, while geese like a clean place, they never leave any place clean in which they have been.”

Of ducks

XI.  “Whoever wishes to keep a flock of ducks and to establish a [Greek:  naessotropheion], should choose for it, above all others if it is possible, a swampy location because that is most agreeable to the ducks, but, if not, then a situation sloping to a natural lake or pool, or to an artificial pond, with steps leading down to it, practicable for the ducks.  The enclosure where they are kept should have a wall fifteen feet high, such as you saw at Seius’ villa, with only one door opening into it.  All around the wall on the inside should run a broad platform on which are built against the wall the duck houses, fronting on a level concrete vestibule in which is constructed a permanent channel in which their food can be placed in water, for ducks are fed in that way.  The entire wall should be given a smooth coating of stucco to keep out polecats[190] and other animals of prey, and the enclosure should be covered with a net of large mesh to prevent eagles from pouncing in and the ducks themselves from flying out.[191]

“For food they are given wheat, barley, grape marc, and some times even lobsters and other such aquatic animals.  The pond in the enclosure should be fed with a large head of water so that it may be kept always fresh.

“There are other kinds of similar birds, like teals and coots which may be fed in the same way.